Distant Shores
by seven dragons
Summary: When Mei Lin shows up on Blake's door step, what should have been his greatest dream come true becomes a disaster. But Jean was right all along. In the end Jean was his love but Mei Lin was his wife, and that was all that mattered. Post S4 AU looks at what happened if Lucien had stayed with Mei Lin, and the profound effect it has on three lives.


It had been inevitable. When Mei Lin showed up on his door step, what should have been his greatest dream come true became a disaster. He couldn't process it at first. His mind utterly rejected the concept. He made life so unbearable for his own wife that she had to leave the house rather than take refuge where she belonged. Jean had wanted to move out right away. She said his wife had to come first, but Lucien could not bear to be parted from Jean, and Jean relented. Unfortunately Mei Lin did not return to him alone. Lucien's entire past, sins and all, came rushing home with her. In the end, Mei Lin confessed to a crime she did not commit to protect him. She almost gave up her life as well, all so Lucien and Jean could have their freedom together. It was that day, holding Mei Lin as she gasped for breath, that he knew he could never leave her. It took him a while to realize what Jean knew all along. Jean was his love but Mei Lin was his wife, and that was all that mattered.

Three days later, Jean was gone. They had both agreed that Mei Lin should move in as soon as possible, but that meant Jean had to clear out. Lucien had wanted to buy her an apartment in town or at least pay her rent but Jean refused. She said it made her feel like a kept woman, and she wanted to make a clean break. She wouldn't accept cash, even as a job bonus. She assured Lucien that everything would be fine, that she would head back to Adelaide and stay with her family. Lucien didn't ask any questions, he just needed her out. Jean left in the middle of the day while Lucien was at the hotel with Mei Lin. Lucien came home to an empty house and he knew she'd left without even looking for her. The sense of home, the feeling of peace he had come to associate with it, were palpably gone as if Jean had simply packed them up with the rest of her belongings. In the back of his head he knew that something had gone horribly wrong, but mostly Lucien was relieved he didn't have to say goodbye. It took several days for the enormity of his loss to sink in.

The first few weeks were rough. Lucien drank constantly to try and dull the pain of Jean's absence and mostly ignored Mei Lin. Mei Lin would complain bitterly to him but he would just bark at her and send her out of the room. It really wasn't her fault, Lucien thought. She wants the husband she remembers and he can no longer be that man. That man is dead. Most of him died in a prison camp in Singapore. The rest disappeared when he found out Mei Lin had died. Then, impossibly resurrected by Jean's love, the last shreds of Lucien's former self died for good the afternoon he came home and realized Jean had moved out. That it was at Lucien's request didn't seem to make a difference. Dead was dead. Charlie also moved out a month later. He had never forgiven Lucien for the way he treated Jean. In a way, Lucien was glad. Someone in the house should put Jean first.

Eventually things returned to some semblance of a normal life, even if that life no longer felt to Lucien like his own. Mei Lin was a passable cook and house wife, she always had been. She was a clever woman and picked up the surgery duties easily. Lucien treated her with polite affection and as much kindness as he could muster. If he had no real love for her she was still his wife, and he owed her everything. Mei Lin shrewdly inserted herself into Ballarat's social life. They had cocktail parties at the house and would invite the local dignitaries and community leaders. Lucien always outwardly pretended to be the happy husband and put on a show for the crowd. His old friends would not have been fooled but he rarely saw them anymore, most of them now kept their distance. Patrick Tynneman was a regular at Mei Lin and Lucien's parties. He had always been uncomfortable around Lucien but now he seemed almost terrified. Even in Lucien's own home he kept his distance. It was as if there was a bomb in the room and Patrick was the only one who could see it. Patrick was the exception, none of their new friends saw them for anything other than the happy couple they pretended to be.

Mei Lin had only been living in the house a few days when they made love for the first time. Drunk, miserable, and missing Jean, he could not ignore the passion that he and Mei Lin had once shared. Above all, she was a warm and willing body that he could claim for his own. It should have been a glorious homecoming but to Lucien it felt empty. Every few weeks after that Lucien would take her to bed to maintain the illusion of marriage, but he took little pleasure in it. The sex was hollow and mechanical. He always made love in complete silence, fearful of accidentally calling out Jean's name. While Jean had given him her heart but never her body, it was still the only thing he wanted. He would look down at his wife, naked in bed, and all he could see was Jean. When he was finished, he would give Mei Lin a cursory kiss on the forehead and roll over and go to sleep. He always hoped to fall asleep before Mei Lin started crying. She knew he didn't love her. She knew each time he undressed her he wished it was Jean. Lucien made no attempt to comfort her or try to persuade her otherwise. It was all true, and there was nothing he could do to change things.

A few months later the phone rang, and Lucien was shocked to hear Christopher Jr.'s voice on the other end. He was looking for his mother. She had not been returning his letters and he was worried about her. Lucien quickly realized that Christopher had no idea that Jean had left. Mei Lin must have been tossing out his letters before Lucien could see them. He was not surprised. She was not going to risk Lucien going out and looking for Jean. Mei Lin knew he might not come back. Rather than tell Christopher that Jean was gone he simply promised to pass on the message and said that he'd hear from her soon. Lucien had always assumed that Jean had gone back to Adelaide. He didn't think it possible that Jean had been in Ballarat all this time and he didn't know it, the town wasn't that big. Lucien headed out immediately to find her. He needed to know that she was ok. Guessing that her friends at the church would know where she was, he paid a call on Evelyn Toohey. Mrs. Toohey was very hesitant to tell Lucien where she was living. An acquaintance and briefly his own housekeeper, she almost seemed scared of him now. She was a religious woman and Lucien would have thought Mrs. Toohey would approve of him putting his wife first. Instead he had to promise he would deliver the message and then leave Jean be in order to get her address. It turned out Jean had been in Ballarat all along, living on the other side of town.

Lucien went straight to her flat and knocked on the door. If Jean had a reaction to seeing his face for the first time in six months she didn't show it. She just stood there passively. It was immediately apparent to Lucien that something was different. She was always a proud woman and her appearance was no less meticulous now, but there were signs. A frayed sleeve, a patch in her skirt, the beginning of a run in her stocking. Most alarmingly, she had lost weight. She had always been thin, but she had been fit and healthy. Now she appeared pale and almost gaunt. He knew what he was looking at. It was poverty. It had not occurred to Lucien when Jean left that even if she could match the salary he paid her that the living expenses would be steeper than she could afford. She'd lived well under Lucien's roof, but women who did domestic and menial work rarely prospered. Lucien reminded himself that she was the one who had refused any financial support, but he was unconvinced by his own argument. Lucien noticed the boxes on the floor behind her. It was clear Jean wasn't going to invite him in so he finally spoke.

"Moving?"

Jean forced a smile. "Yes, to a room further out of town. It will be nice and cozy."

Lucien winced. She was already nearly a mile from downtown where she probably worked. "A room?"

"Yes, with some other boarders." Lucien could feel his chest constricting. Very recently he had planned to take care of Jean for the rest of her life. Now he had let her slip through the cracks and she was still falling.

"Jean, I thought you had gone back to Adelaide, to be near Christopher."

Jean lowered her head. The woman Lucien had loved so dearly could barely make eye contact with him now. "I couldn't do it. He knew why I left Adelaide so soon, after promising to help with the baby. He knew I left to follow you. I just couldn't go back and face him."

"He called the house. He doesn't know you moved out."

"I'll go over to my neighbor's flat tomorrow and see if they have a phone. I can call him and let him know."

This last statement nearly caused him to break down. For months he had felt little, suppressing any hurt but also any real affection. Now all he could feel was pain, raw and unfiltered. He wanted to fall to his knees and beg her forgiveness but he was the one who had sent her away. He had made his choice, and he was going to live with it. His misery was suitable penance for what he had done. At the same time, he felt a growing anger towards Jean. She was the one who had insisted he go back to Mei Lin in the first place. Why didn't she stay and fight? Why didn't she at least ask for his love? Did she ever really care for him? He wanted to berate her, to belittle her as a faithless woman. He looked Jean in the eye and realized it was pointless. Once a fiercely proud woman her eyes were now dull and lifeless. The sense of peace and stability that he had felt before she moved out of his home had not followed her here. Jean had always been a survivor, and he had broken her.

Lucien walked through the door of his house and straight into his office. He pulled out a bottle of whiskey. Next to the bottle was the small leather case that held his mother's engagement ring, in the same place he left it on the day Jean returned it. He was determined that Mei Lin never wear it. If Jean couldn't have it, no one could. He drank through the night without pause. Only passing out near sunrise ended it. When Mei Lin looked into his office later that morning she did not bother to wake him. She watched him for several minutes in dismay and left, but paused in the doorway when she heard his voice.

"Mei Lin." She turned around. Lucien could see the agony in her eyes. She knew where he'd been.

"Li and her family must be well settled in Hong Kong by now. Maybe it's time we joined them. Would you like to move back there?"

Mei Lin could hardly believe what she was hearing. "But where you will work?"

"I'll go back to the army. They'll take me. They owe me a favor after all that has happened."

For the next few weeks Mei Lin was floating on air. Aside from the prospect of going home and seeing Li, she thought it would be a fresh start for her and Lucien. They would be happy again and things would be like they were before. Lucien knew this would never be the case, but he smiled affectionately and let her think it. They booked passage on a ship to China and sold nearly everything, the house, the car, and most of his father's possessions. He didn't even keep the family photographs. Everything in the house was attached in some way to Jean, and he needed to leave it all behind. The last thing he did before getting on the ship was to put his mother's engagement ring in the post with a note to Jean asking her to sell it. Part of him thought he was doing her a favor since he knew she needed the money. Part of him thought he might be visiting one last cruelty on her for not being willing to fight as hard for them as Lucien would have been.

He was genuinely looking forward to being reunited with his daughter but he now found the prospect bittersweet. It was a joy he had once dreamed of sharing with Jean. Lucien stood on the deck of the ship and watched as the shore of his homeland faded into the distance, and was glad to be leaving behind the ashes of the love he had burned to the ground. He knew he would never return. As the ship charged into the night towards darker distant shores he resolved to be a dutiful husband, knowing he would never be a loving one. He tried not to think of Jean and the growing ocean between then. Jean was on her own.


End file.
